Head of Engineering
Location: GB, LND, London
Department: IT
Employment type: Full-time
Required experience: Executive
Industry: Computer Software
Function: Information Technology

Company profile:
We experiment with new digital products, retail experiences and business models at M&amp;S.comWe experiment with ways to make shopping really easy for our customers: we want our customers to browse, discover, and buy in ways that suit them.We experiment with new business models: we question the needs and wants of our customers and reimagine how to fulfil them from the ground up.Our team have mostly come from well known European startups and we love working with innovators who want to make a difference!Our business is changing. We have over 22 million customers. By investing heavily in technology, in the last year alone our online sales have gone up 16.6% and sales via mobile have rocketed over 200% following the launch of our dedicated mobile apps. But we don’t want to just transform our own business; we want to revolutionise retail. Which is where you come in.

Job description:
Based in London, to lead the development of the in house software engineering function for M&amp;S covering-        eCommerce and multi channel platforms-        Digital innovation-        Enterprise Apps-        IntegrationWork closely with the business and IT leadership to understand the strategy and requirements for engineering and technical innovationTo design and recruit a long term scalable team to take on more engineering projects in houseMaintain a good knowledge of new technologies and innovation in technology industry and leveraging these to benefit the organisation.Understand key competitor and retail trends and ensure the team are best equipped to support the business Develop the agile methodology for use across M&amp;SDetermine when / where to invest in new technologies, skill sets and engineering innovation initiatives / infrastructure  Work closely with the business Product leads driving the development &amp; delivery of innovation and the implementation of new solutions.Lead the cross functional team taking accountability for the team outcome and qualityEnsure the team maintain and improve the agile development methodologies and best practicesDevelop and ensure the team promotes good software engineering practices (e.g. continuous integration, test driven development, performance in design).Work with the technical architects to drive a consolidated view of services and technologies ensuring that other dependencies and requirements across are clearly understood and delivered against.Work with solution and technical architects to speed up development processes and get faster work out to test

Requirements:
Develop and grow the in-house engineering functionDevelop people, skills, agile methodologies and technologies required to support the engineering functionWork with the existing supplier base to architect and define how the  in-house engineering function can deliver along-side the supplier and support baseWork hand-in-hand with the business teams to deliver new technology innovations and projectsWork hand-in-hand with the relevant IT teams to support the development of new engineering projects (eg architecture, infrastructure and support)Bring knowledge of new technologies, innovation and trends to the team and wider IT groupDevelop a governance framework for engineering projects recognising the need to:-        Be agile-        Differentiate engineering projects by priority, scalability and / or prototypesRollout processes and engineering capabilities to other areas within the IT group depending on project applicabilityDevelop the team based on 50% experienced and 50% graduatesCreate the internal capability and environment that will attract high calibre software engineers    

Benefits: